


Extension

by destielpasta



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alcohol, Coda, Demon Dean, Episode: s09e23 Do You Believe in Miracles?, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, almost human castiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-22
Updated: 2014-05-22
Packaged: 2018-01-26 03:10:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1672490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/destielpasta/pseuds/destielpasta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coda for 9.23: Do you Believe in Miracles? Shifting points of view.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Extension

**Sam**

The whiskey burns on the way down. He doesn't even like this shit, and Dean never bought the good stuff. He would drink it by the glass, keeping his eyes tucked away behind a computer screen as if Sam couldn't see him. He feels like they hadn't seen each other in months.

His shoulders ache from carrying Dean. Age. Sam's at the point where aching bones become a problem and digging a grave isn't going to be a walk in the park. Carrying bodies too.

Of course he prays to Cas, questioning himself the whole time. He hasn't prayed in years, not in earnest, and how the hell do you call down an angel that has no wings? An angel with his hands full already? He sticks to the basics: _You better get down here_ and _It's Sam, we need your help, get here as soon as you can._ He thinks about some doctor show Dean watched months ago in that ratty motel with the plaid wallpaper. Never tell family about death over the phone.

No rush of wings, no flapping trench coat. Maybe Cas used up all that grace. Maybe he's stuck.

He downs the rest of his drink before standing up and heading down to the dungeon. He can scream at the ceiling, if nothing else.

 

**Hannah**

Castiel can't seem to stand up straight.

Even after exposing Metatron and 'saving the day' as the humans would call it, he still stands with a curve to his spine, a downward lilt to his expression. His smiles had been rare even before, fading to a frown every time they called for their _Commander_.

“I just want to be an angel.”

She remembers witnessing feelings like this. Distress. Distraught. Grief. She had thought the acting on the human TV show had been trite, when the hero held his fallen love in his arms, struggling to speak and screaming with rage, later looking like a ghost of his former self entrenched in denial. Castiel can barely speak through the thickness in his throat; his fingers twitch with the need to wipe tears away.

He wishes to be an angel, as his stolen grace fades to a dull glow. She feels her own grace crackling in her fingertips, potent and fiery, never very injured from the fall, as her other brothers and sisters had been. She could offer it to him, to heal his friend, to bring him back if he really was gone. Even _her_ wings are gone, however.

She escorts him out of heaven, feeling like she owes him that, at least. He takes a moment at the door, looking at her quizzically, almost affectionately.

“Perhaps it's your turn to lead, Hannah.”

He's gone far too quickly, the door sealing with a burst of light behind him, and Hannah wonders at the pit she feels forming in her stomach. A tug, a need; a friend would be missed more than a leader.

 

**Castiel**

_It's Sam, we need your help, get here as soon as you can._

Sam's prayers are welcome, comforting even, but come with the sour realization that Dean must truly be dead. He does what he's told, getting in his car and speeding off to Kansas as soon as his feet hit solid earth again. He doesn't turn the radio on.

He tries to make a mental catalogue of memories. Crystal clear and harsh angelic memories; watching Dean from the shadows, talking to him about humanity.Dimmer human memories of Dean's smile offset by the garish light of the Gas and Sip and of him tenderly caring for Nora's child, singing her a proper lullaby with a pleasing voice. He gets sidetracked by that same voice.

_We're family. We need you. I need you._

He feels the waste of his humanity to his very core. He should have spent it trying every pie imaginable. Watching every episode of Star Trek. Counting stars. Telling his friends that he loves them. Touching Dean in the dark.

He shakes his head to clear it, feeling the burn of shame at his own thoughts. Dean wouldn't appreciate him thinking of him in this way, not when he was dead. Not when so little time had passed. Not when he didn't even have enough grace to clean the blood from his own face let alone bring Dean Winchester back to life.

It's a new moon, a completely still and quiet night. He turns off the ignition. The hatch door swings open, and he wonders if Sam forgot to lock it or if he's just feeling reckless.

“Sam?” he calls down the staircase. Sam's prayers had stopped an hour ago. Somewhere a clock ticks. He hears water dripping in the kitchen. There's an empty glass next to the half-full bottle of whiskey on the table.

He makes his way down the hallway, cautious step after cautious step, passing closed doorways. He can make out a dark lump at the end of the hallway by Dean's room, shrouded by shadows.

Crowley.

He's not dead, Castiel can feel that much, but a trickle of blood runs from his forehead and nose and it looks like something managed to knock him him out. Castiel gives him a few shakes and then he's gasping for breath, clutching at Cas's coat.

“Christ-- of all the-- Cas?” he sputters out, seeing Castiel above him.

“Where's Sam?” His voice sounds murderous, his patience spent on angels.

He grimaces and pushes Cas away, stumbling to his feet. “Hell if I know-- Prince of Darkness knocked me out--”

“Sam?”

“No, sweetheart,” he grins as he straightens his coat, wiping his bloody nose with his sleeve. “Your boy.”

A gust of wind catches in Castiel's throat. His words come out raspy, choked. “Dean? He's alive.” He dares not pose the question. Crowley could say no.

“In a manner of speaking...” Crowley looks past him, down the hallway.

Castiel follows his sightline, seeing nothing but empty hallway. He turns back around to find Crowley gone.

“Dammit,” he whispers.

 

**Dean**

He doesn't expect to feel _quite_ this smoky. Literally. His own essence catches in his throat and burns away at whatever human that's left; tender flesh scalded by the new heat and leaving behind the stench of cooking meat. Gross.

The snark comes naturally, of course. He's still himself, surprisingly enough, and taking a swing at Crowley was just that much more satisfying now that he could feel another demon's bones snap under his fist. It was easy with Crowley, of course.

Not so much with Cas, and Sam would be even harder.

“What do you think, Cas?” he says, letting his eyes flicker back and forth between black and normal, a trick he had perfected in the last hour, “Suits me pretty damn well, right?”

“Dean,” Cas whispers, that damn name.

Dean waits for the blade to drop into Cas's hand, waits for his lips to pull back into a disgusted snarl with anger and a fight and _something he can fucking sink his teeth into he's going fucking crazy here_ but Cas just stands there, a goddamn smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth.

“I thought... You were dead, I-- I _knew_ it.”

Cas's voice trembles, and Dean feels that annoying desire to take it and smooth it out himself and work out the kinks in Castiel's forehead while he's at it and that's definitely not demonic enough for him right now. But really, what had been stopping him before? Pride? Latent internalized hatred for himself and whatever his father hadn't approved of?

That's probably it.

“What is this, Cas? The Notebook?” he chuckles, “You got a sixth sense about me? Surprising, now that I'm an abomination.”

“You're still you, Dean, this isn't-- we can fix this.”

So goddamn hopeful. So goddamn perfect with those baby blues and that adorable tendency to look on the bright side and that _mouth_. The first blade digs into the small of his back, sending a pulse through him.

_Now,_ it insists.

_Soon,_ he hisses back.

It'll be so easy, he figures. Cas barely has a stitch of angel left in him, his angelic face is fading by the second, slowly replaced with a void neither black or white. He would die anyway. Maybe he could just wait.

The blade doesn't like that, and it punishes him for it, sending a shock of intense pain through him, snapping his neck to the side.

“Dean!” Cas rushes forward, somehow getting his hands around Dean's forearms to steady him.

That won't do, mostly because Dean instinctively reaches up to grasp at Cas, one hand wrinkling that awful trench coat and the other grabbing his shoulder. He feels his eyes flickering again and it's not on purpose this time.

“Fucking Christ, Cas, you stupid?” he says, all traces of banter gone and replaced with a voice so unlike his own, “I'm not-- I'm not me right now you gotta get out of here--”

“No,” Cas says, little more than an exhalation against Dean's skin.

Cas backs him up until they hit the wall, with what strength, he doesn't even know, and he can't care because the reprieve is over. Heat is building in his abdomen again and he smells the burning, the sulfur. Himself.

“Gonna save me Cas?” he taunts, snarls ripping from his throat, “Gonna turn me into one of your pet projects? You know I can just smoke out, leave this rotting thing behind, right?”

“Don't,” Cas says, more of a plea than an order. One hand still clutches at his arm but the other moves up to his face, still tender, still so fucking loving.

Dean laughs at it. “You're a dud, Cas. Barely an angel. You can't get me to do anything right now--”

“We're family.”

“What?”

“You're my family,” Cas whispers, moving the other hand to his face, forcing Dean's eyes to meet his.

“What the-” Dean jerks in Cas's arm, trying to shove a knee into the other man's groin but Cas deflects it with his thigh, buckling still from the pain, but pushing in further so that his body pins Dean to the wall.

“I need you.”

Dean stops struggling, grasping Cas's jacket tight enough for his fingernails to pierce skin.

“I need you no matter what you are, what you did. I-- all I wanted was to save you.”

Dean huffs out a laugh, coughing on the tail end. “You're too late.”

“No,” Cas says immediately, “You're alive.”

“Try again."

It's Cas's turn to laugh. He looks down, resting his forehead against Dean's. It's cool, and it feels like medicine so Dean leans into it.

“Dean,” he says, like a prayer, “Don't go alone.”

Dean shivers, feeling another surge of the blade coming on. His hands shake but he lets them roam, scoping out Cas's back and moving up to grasp at his hair, holding on to something, whatever Cas wants to offer.

Cas looks up, eyes wide, and nods.

 

**Sam**

Sam hears a thump, abandoning his summoning to fly up the stairs. He feels his heart in his throat because it sounded like _two_ pairs of feet.

He makes it up quick enough to see two figures, braced together in the hallway by Dean's bedroom. His brother, alive and upright and with black eyes, and Castiel, pale with absolute exhaustion. Huddled against the wall, they struggle for a moment, something like a sob escaping from Dean before he takes a handful of Cas's hair in his hands and twists. Sam surges forward, hand outstretched.

His hand grasps at empty air. They disappear.


End file.
